"Come quick! You gotta see this thing in the water!", shouted our yacht charter guest.
Smiling at their excitement, we snorkeled over to the spot of interest located almost directly above the Wreck of the Rhone in the British Virgin Islands. Feeling rather professional after 14 years of leading snorkeling trips here in the islands, we couldn't image not being able to identify most any creature of the sea. But! We were completely stumped by this "thing" that for lack of better words, looked every bit like a long purple slinky covered in eggs. With lots of friends having many years of experience between us, we began asking everyone if they had ever seen anything like it. Finally, Ann on the yacht Sandcastle, with her degree in zoology and an insatiable water bug, classified our find as oceanic squid eggs.
Ok, what kind of creature produces oceanic squid eggs? Is it as wacky as the egg mass we saw? Well, almost. Our big "purple slinky" was made by a Diamond back squid. They belong to a group of large, muscular marine mollusks (the same group as snails and conch) which are called the Cephalopods (their name literally means the 'head-foot' group). They're found throughout tropical and subtropical regions of the world's oceans occupying near-surface waters during the night and mid-waters during the day. They have rather short arms and large triangular fins that extend the full length of the mantle. These animals include the squids and cuttlefish and they are cousins as it were to the octopi, so they have relatively soft pulp-like cylindrical bodies with a circle of tentacles at one end.
The difference here is that the Diamondback squids are relatively large animals with an average weight of around 33 lb. and measuring up to 3 feet in length . The proper name for them is Thysanoteuthis rhombus and another common name for them is the Barrel squid as their large plump bodies look a lot like a red barrel. But are they unique to this part of the Caribbean? Actually, they are found all around the tropics and even sub-tropics of the entire globe, but only at considerable depth. How deep is this you might ask? The average depth distribution of adults is around 4,500 feet! In fact, they only become available to fisherman when they approach around 1,000 feet to reproduce.
Having a 1 year life span, they lay long, sausage-shaped egg masses that float just beneath the surface of the ocean. Eggs lie in a double strand that wind helically around a large gelatinous core. Embryos near to hatching bear large numbers of chromatophores. This is the most commonly observed egg mass of any oceanic squid. The consistency of the oblong mass was loosely gelatinous but not firm enough to offer tangible resistance to our ungloved hand. It has been said that embedded within this gelatinous matrix were 35,000 to 75,000 individual eggs, each containing a single developing embryo. Each embryo was distributed diffusely enough that they were clearly visible through the entire thickness of the mass.
Tempting as a food source for both islanders and for export, the oceanic squid has been studied as recently as 2005 in Jamaica. Biologist Dr. Karl Aiken, working in conjunction with a marine ecologist from the Montego Bay Marine Park, along with CMI's JICA fisheries experts Takahiko Yasuda and other CMI staff, organized a series of trips to explore Jamaican coastal waters. This exploratory fishing was fully supported by the Fisheries division who promoted their effort to try to shift even some of the large number of fishers off the heavily fished reef fishery resources. The specially customized squid fishing gear was adapted from a successful Japanese design. In the end, it seems as though the idea of fishing for oceanic squid as a food source has died due to the difficulty of fishing in such deep waters.
Sex on the reef? You bet! The discovery of egg masses and the creatures that created them made for quite a lot of excitement aboard the yacht Three Moons. But all joking aside, the ocean is a never ending source of amazement and learning for us all!
Learn more about the yacht Three Moons: http://threemoonsyacht.net
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Ok, what kind of creature produces oceanic squid eggs? Is it as wacky as the egg mass we saw? Well, almost. Our big "purple slinky" was made by a Diamond back squid. They belong to a group of large, muscular marine mollusks (the same group as snails and conch) which are called the Cephalopods (their name literally means the 'head-foot' group). They're found throughout tropical and subtropical regions of the world's oceans occupying near-surface waters during the night and mid-waters during the day. They have rather short arms and large triangular fins that extend the full length of the mantle. These animals include the squids and cuttlefish and they are cousins as it were to the octopi, so they have relatively soft pulp-like cylindrical bodies with a circle of tentacles at one end.
The difference here is that the Diamondback squids are relatively large animals with an average weight of around 33 lb. and measuring up to 3 feet in length . The proper name for them is Thysanoteuthis rhombus and another common name for them is the Barrel squid as their large plump bodies look a lot like a red barrel. But are they unique to this part of the Caribbean? Actually, they are found all around the tropics and even sub-tropics of the entire globe, but only at considerable depth. How deep is this you might ask? The average depth distribution of adults is around 4,500 feet! In fact, they only become available to fisherman when they approach around 1,000 feet to reproduce.
Having a 1 year life span, they lay long, sausage-shaped egg masses that float just beneath the surface of the ocean. Eggs lie in a double strand that wind helically around a large gelatinous core. Embryos near to hatching bear large numbers of chromatophores. This is the most commonly observed egg mass of any oceanic squid. The consistency of the oblong mass was loosely gelatinous but not firm enough to offer tangible resistance to our ungloved hand. It has been said that embedded within this gelatinous matrix were 35,000 to 75,000 individual eggs, each containing a single developing embryo. Each embryo was distributed diffusely enough that they were clearly visible through the entire thickness of the mass.
Tempting as a food source for both islanders and for export, the oceanic squid has been studied as recently as 2005 in Jamaica. Biologist Dr. Karl Aiken, working in conjunction with a marine ecologist from the Montego Bay Marine Park, along with CMI's JICA fisheries experts Takahiko Yasuda and other CMI staff, organized a series of trips to explore Jamaican coastal waters. This exploratory fishing was fully supported by the Fisheries division who promoted their effort to try to shift even some of the large number of fishers off the heavily fished reef fishery resources. The specially customized squid fishing gear was adapted from a successful Japanese design. In the end, it seems as though the idea of fishing for oceanic squid as a food source has died due to the difficulty of fishing in such deep waters.
Sex on the reef? You bet! The discovery of egg masses and the creatures that created them made for quite a lot of excitement aboard the yacht Three Moons. But all joking aside, the ocean is a never ending source of amazement and learning for us all!
Learn more about the yacht Three Moons: http://threemoonsyacht.net
